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TWO-The Gazette-Times, Heppner, Ore., Thursday, August 11, 1977
Business license a bust
in merchants' eyes
Heppner is seeing some "grass roots" govern
ment first hand.
Last week it came to light the city council was
thinking about instituting a business license; an act
that requires the passage of an ordinance, that is, a
municipal statute or law.
By the end of the week, the Heppner Merchants
Committee, a branch of the Chamber of Commerce,
had circulated copies of the rough draft of the
ordinance and more than 30 business people
attended their regular monthly committee meeting
Friday to voice their disapproval of the license.
To a person, the consensus was "we don't want
it."
EDITORIAL
The business people did not object to the $12
annual fee suggested for the first year, but, they did
object to the reason for the license. As stated in the
rough draft of the ordinance; "It is necessary that
business licenses be levied and fixed for the purpose
of securing revenue to assist in deferring the cost of
police and fire protection and the cost of other
Hull
Letters to the Editor
Memory rails
Editor:
The recent article on the Union Pacific rail run from Hinkle
to Heppner brought back memories of an earlier but no less
glorified train.
Our family moved to Heppner from Butter Creek in
September, 1928.
Time flies doesn't it? Fifty years this coming September I
entered the 3rd Grade at Pleasant Point School, a one room
school house which, I believe, is still standing. Shouldn't it be
preserved as a museum piece?
Our teacher was the beloved Juanita Leathers Carmichael,
the pride of Hardman, and now a resident of your town with
her husband C.C. "Judge" Carmichael.
Among my classmates were the Cunninghams, Cunhas,
Dalys, Swaggarts, Hottmans, Allan Struthers, Raymond
Clark and, possibly, one or two others I have overlooked.
However, let's go back to the train story for a moment or
two.
This now ancient "Iron Horse" was the life line between
Heppner and Portland.
Familiarly known as the "Galloping Goose", Main Street
literally "died a slow death" if the train was several hours
late. If I recall, the departure time from Heppner Junction
was about 3:50 a.m. with a scheduled Heppner arrival at 6
a.m. The train carried a combination passenger, mail and
baggage car along with a few carloads of freight which
straggled behind. There was switching enroute at Cecil,
Morgan, lone and Lexington. If my memory serves me
correctly, one of the engineers was a man by the name of
Egan. Also, a gentleman by the name of Happold was a
member of the crew, too. Here, though, I may be in error. Or
was it Ason?
The importance of the train to the economy of Heppner was
that it carried nearly all of the staple foodstuffs and many
other important business items from the shelves of Portland
wholesalers to keep such grocery stores as Malcolm Clark's
Red & White Store (Will Ball worker for him), Thomson
Bros., Hyatt & Dix and Hustons operating. Not to forget such
fine drug stores as Humphreys and Pattersons; hardware
stores such as the People's Hardware (La Verne Van Marter,
Sr.) and Gilliam-Bisbee. Not to forget that fine Chinese
restaurant, the Elkhorn, run by Eddie Chin and that Main
Street "Toots Shor" establishment, Earl W. Gordon's Soda
Fountain ran in conjunction with his wife Charlotte. Hey, I
almost forgot Hanson and Sam Hughes grocery. And the
meat markets ran by Henry Schwartz and A.E. Burkenbine.
Oh, yes! Memories! Memories! Why don't they make
business establishments like the foregoing anymore?
Oh I could ramble on and on and mention the excellent
teachers I had from the fourth through the eighth grade and
the classmates I will not readily forget. Teachers names, oh
yes ! Miriam McDonald, Juanita Crawford, Blanche Hansen,
Juanita Leathers and that fine band leader iron Canby,
Harold Buhman. Classmates such as La Verne Van Marter,
Charles "Buttermilk" Cox, Leonard Gilman, Jonnie Hanna,
Jim Healy, Kathryn and Marjorie Parker, Louise Anderson
and others too numerous to mention. Who can forget Neil
Shuirman, Don Mabee, W.R. Poulson, Jim Burgess and Lucy
Rodgers, school superintendent.
Lastly, "Dad" Driscoll whom, I believe, was the only one
to have faith in Notre Dame beating USC in 1932 (27-0) and
won himself a sizeable bet.
William "Ole" Mitchell
Daly City, Ca. 94015
Preserve our heritage
To the people of Morrow County:
Your county Historical Society and your county Museum
are dedicated to the preservation of those things which our
forefathers found necessary or worthwile, in order that they
might build a home in this raw and hostile land and begin to
earn a living. v
There is, however, one phase of this work that has not been
undertaken. This is the gathering and restoring of the
machines and tools that the farmers, stockmen, miners and
loggers used to subdue this frontier.
Most any oldtimer will tell you that a greater part of the
early tools and machinery were hand made. If they weren't
made in the farmer's own shop, they were made at a local
blacksmith shop.
As wood was cheaper to obtain and easier to work with,
most early machines were of wood with a little iron at the
worst points of strain or wear. Due to this fact, the machinery
should be maintained in a suitable building when it is
gathered and restored.
As a result of two World Wars and their scrap drives, much
of our inheritances have already been gathered and beat into
swords. But if we do not tarry too long, I believe that there is
still enough things that can be gathered to make a very
respectable and worthwhile machinery museum.
I have contacted several people whom I thought would be
interested in preserving our machinery heritage and along
with the Historical Society, we feel that we should press
forward with plans to obtain a suitable sile and then erect a
building. If action is not taken soon, the opportunity will
vanish forever.
I would very much like to hear from anyone who is
interested in a project of this nature.
Anyone who has machinery that they would like to see
restored and preserved or who has ideas on building sites or
ways of financing buildings please contact me as soon as
possible.
Harold K. Peck
Chairman, Antique Farm Machinery
Morrow County Historical Society
Sifting through the TIMES!
EDITORIAL LETTERS
-COMMENT J
necessary municipal services."
It is a bit much, to think the $800 or so the licenses
would have raised for the city coffers would really
go very far in offsetting police and fire
costs especially after taking out attorney fees for
drawing up the ordinance and the cost of publishing
the ordinance in the paper.
The businessmen and women were, in fact,
objecting to more government involvement in their
livelihoods. We agree.
There are valid arguments to be made for having
an ordinance requiring a business license because it
does give some control over what types of business
will be allowed to locate in a community. At last
Friday's meeting someone said there was no need to
control business, that to do so is interfering with
free enterprise. We wonder what the reaction would
be if someone chose to open a "massage" parlor on
Main Street tomorrow.
At any rate, the city council was doing its job in
bringing up the issue of a business license; the
community such a license would affect responded
and made its wishes known; and now we feel the
city council can finish its job drop the idea of
instituting a business license.
The usual process here is to wade through the dust, pull out
the old volumes, stack the appropriate intervals on the desk
and begin the search. ..playing the role of the perquisitor and
using as a reference one of the few sources that doesn't add a
new splash of color or an enhancing flourish each time the
event is recounted.
The weekly newspaper maintains its place as a community
yardstick measuring progressions and chronicling set
backsand hopefully coming up with a reflection of the time
and place in which we live.
This week it was necessary only to go back to 1957 for the
following piece, reprinted from the Baldwin (NY) Citizen,
which captures the substance sought by this column and the
entire paper.
Why A Weekly Press?
Surrounded by hefty daily newspapers, on-the-spot
television newscasts, frequent radio news broadcasts, all
covering important events foreign and domestic what does
the suburban reader get out of his local weekly?
What he gets, if his weekly is a good one, is a detailed
knowledge of the community in which he lives, in which his
children are raised, in which his private life is passed.
Daily newspapers, television, radio all are called the
"mass media." and rightly so. They deal, as they should,
with mass events, mass movements when an individual
enters, he is, almost always, an individual whose actions
have had an effect on a large number of people for good or for
bad. The mass media are, and pride themselves on being, the
voice of The People.
But I am not a people. You are not a people. We are
persons, you and I, and we need to know what is happening
that affpcts us as persons, and what the persons we live
among are doing that will touch our daily, private lives.
We want to know, also, how larger events touch us. We may
read in the dailies, for example, that the State education
department has decided that all schools must offer certain
courses in this or that field. This means little until we find,
on reading our local weekly, that the high school our child
will attend next year has shifted its curriculum to offer the
mandated course.
The local paper, also, can act as a lever to raise standards
in local government, to improve local facilities, to acquaint
the individual voter with actions of his particular
representative in government and to acquaint the
representative with the principal subjects of concern to the
local community.
The local weekly can help preserve the importance of each
man in his own right. It is a cynical old saying that everyone
is created equal, only some are more equal than others. The
engagement of your daughter is as important to you and to
God as the engagement of the president's daughter and,
though the metropolitan daily may find little of no room for
this supreme event, the local weekly can and will tell your
world of her happiness.
There are other functions for the slim, sometimes
unpolished little sheet to perform it can trumpet the merits
of your own home town, tell you where you can buy that dress
without going miles away, warn against community blight
and tell you that Aunt Millie is back from Florida and your
fourth grade teacher is in the hospital maybe you should
send her a card?
All these things the dailies, television or radio cannot do.
Their news must interest everybody, must affect The People.
They deal with the great of this world. For news about you
and me, read us.
IRHIGON
BOAFDMAN
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iIkPPSF.R
TO BORROW
AND
TOO TOMORROW
By Tom Franks
Overheard in a Heppner
cafe:
First farmer "How was your
wheat crop?"
Second farmer "Got 40
bushels."
First farmer "That good
huh."
Second farmer "Yes, but we
had to cut the whole place to
get it."
Snoose Capitol
One of the most impressive
things about Heppner is the
number of snoose chewers
among teenagers.
Back in my day snoose was
the providence of bush league
baseball players and drug
store cowboys.
I guess I did have my try at
it. A friend got hold of some
"Spark Plug" and off we went
to the local movie house. I
accidentally swallowed mine
and had to run to the lobby for
inordinate amounts of water
and popcorn. Later I tried
some Beechnut on the mound
but it didn't seem to improve
my pitching so I gave it up.
Born To Kill
Murder, strife and envy are
not biochemical effects but
procedures in the human
heart untouched by love.
Behind the argument for the
death penalty often stands the
belief that a person who
murders is born to do so. If one
truly believes in "bad seed"
one might also find cause to
believe that we can breed
saints.
The observation that man is
the only creature that kills,
outside of the confines of the
need for survival, is often the
basis for the argument that he
should be more like the other
animals.
The fact is that man is not
like the other animals and
never has been. It is also true
that murderers are born but
THE
HEPPNER
GAZETTE-TIME
Published every Thursday and entered as a second-class matter at the
Post Office at Heppner, Oregon, under the Act of March 3, 1879.
Second-class postage paid at Heppner, Oregon.
The official newspaper of the City of Heppner and the County of Morrow.
G.M. Reed, Publisher
Dolores Reed, Co-publisher
Terry M. Hager, Business Manager
Jim Summers, Editor
Eileen Saling, Office Manager
Justine Weatherford, Local News
Laura Craig, Composing
Patti Saling, Composing
they are born after they are
born!
Many people get off on the
wrong track with a little
Christian training and inter
pret the word flesh to mean
skin and tissue. The word flesh
is used in the Christian
doctrine to describe a con
dition of the psychology and
not the physiology of man.
So it is true that murderers
are born but they are born in
the human soul and not by the
pound.
I Morrow Gouty
J Hll&lillO
) MATURING
DA!D FiSZZILL
BIP3 TIBBEITS
I NATIONAL RECORDING STARS
J AND HONORING
I 1977 FAIR & RODEO COURT
-SA1TUI3DAV NIGHT
iWiST 13
DANCE FROM 9 TO 1
TO NATIONAL RECORDING
ARTBSTS!
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